


The Stiff and the Tart

by minorthirds



Category: Final Fantasy XIV
Genre: M/M, Oneshot, post-Stormblood but can be read as post-Heavensward if wanted, pre-slash?, starlight
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-10
Updated: 2018-01-10
Packaged: 2019-03-03 02:13:48
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,938
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13331340
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/minorthirds/pseuds/minorthirds
Summary: “Ah, this?” Guydelot notes the subject of Sanson’s attention as the Adder captain settles onto his pristinely-made cot, for lack of another seat. “I got something for you."“For me?” Sanson’s surprise leaves him unguarded, a flash of earnestness dancing over his features – something he is sure to be teased for later, as is the usual. No matter what he does to deprive Guydelot of ammunition, the insufferable bard justdigs it up.“Yes, for you, you dunce,” Guydelot replies, rolling his eyes again with an exaggerated gesture. “Did you forget about Starlight?”It's Starlight, and Guydelot is surprisingly thoughtful.





	The Stiff and the Tart

Birdsong pervades his private room in the Adder barracks like a foul stench this particular winter afternoon. Sanson usually enjoys the sound – usually – but of late the handsome red-bellied robin that makes his nest in the eaves above his window has sounded less like a bird singing and more like... the drunken revelries he’d overheard in Ishgard.

The sort of revelries that would draw Guydelot in like a moth to uncovered flame or, even more likely, the sort of revelries that sprung up organically around the bard like moths to _him._

Sanson shakes his head, settling his uniform cap on his sparsely decorated desk and running a hand through his hair, the chirping of the robin outside a distant thought.

His lance goes on its stand beside his desk, and the papers he’s brought from his last meeting – supply and rations forwarding through Castrum Oriens to aid the Alliance still stationed on the Gyr Abanian border, a report from the sentries at Amarissaix’s Spire, the sort of routine meeting that left Sanson in a bit of a stupor – are dropped on the desk as well.

It’s a little chilly outside, slightly too warm for snow but frigid enough that the birds are staying cozied in their nests and Sanson himself leaves his uniform coat on, grateful for the extra layer of heavy wool. The fauna of the Black Shroud don’t often migrate, and when they do it’s only to different parts of the forest, where the foliage is denser and warmer. It’s the benevolence of the elementals that keeps it so – benevolence, or perhaps habit so rigid it borders on natural law.

Speaking of rigid habits...

Sanson glances at his small mirror moored to the wall, running a hand through his hair again, teasing the ends of the strands with his fingers to adjust the body and fall of the style into something more... tousled. Something freer, more boyish, more like Guydelot’s –

He catches himself with that thought, with that motion, and smooths his hair back into its usual arrangement. _Idiot,_ he berates himself. _You’re Sanson the Stiff, and you’re proud of it. What are you doing?_

It’s a rhetorical question to himself that he still tries to answer, frozen staring at himself in the mirror, his plain features and his plain expression and his plain hair and his plain personality all thrown back at him starkly, in such a manner that he should feel _ashamed_ of it, of himself –

His door swings open with a loud creak, the knob knocking against the far wall, and it’s only at the latter noise that Sanson jerks out of his reverie and comes stumbling back to reality.

“Who –” he starts before he turns, intent on chastising whichever private barged into his quarters without announcement thinking they were on their way to the latrine, but a sharp “ _tut-tut”_ gives him pause.

As does the sight of the man leaning against his doorjamb, his frame taking up the entire space with how he’s angled his torso.

Guydelot’s height is extensive, but fairly typical for the Elezen of Gridania; it’s Sanson who’s on the short side as a Midlander, looking up at the bard, who’s examining his nails as if he’s supposed to be barricading Sanson inside his own room.

His other hand has some sort of rucksack in its grip, and Sanson’s gaze flicks to it for only a second, before returning to Guydelot’s face.

“Can I help you?” Sanson asks, testily.

“Not sure about that one,” Guydelot responds in the same rhythm. “I’m looking for a big stick, you know, like a tree branch –”

Sanson has a sneaking suspicion where Guydelot is going with this one, but he stands with his arms crossed and foot tapping, waiting nonetheless.

“—and I think it’s in here, probably somewhere like up your ass—”

“Yes, yes, I know,” Sanson interrupts Guydelot’s _very clever_ little joke. “I’m the Stiff. Ha ha. Now truly: can I help you? It’s rude to barge into someone’s room without knocking.”

Guydelot rolls his eyes. “I can’t come to visit?”

Sanson turns around and walks back over to his window, a clear invitation for Guydelot to enter though he’d never quite say it in words. “Are those the manners you were raised with?” he counters, occupying himself with straightening his various trinkets and baubles, the majority of which had been accumulated by the side of the man in his doorway.

“I was raised in the woods,” Guydelot quips, as if that were unusual in Gridania.

Despite all his posturing to the contrary, the bard possesses enough social grace to close the door behind himself, as Sanson notes when he turns around again. The latter indicates the chair before his desk with the tilt of his hand, and Guydelot grabs the back of the crude wooden chair and twists, settling it on the ground between his legs and sinking into it in one smooth motion, straddling the seat in the worst possible imitation of an unscrupulous youth.

Sanson’s unaffected gaze settles for the barest moment on the stretch of Guydelot’s leather trousers across his thighs, strained in the position and clinging to the muscle beneath, and he forces his glance to something less... _preoccupying,_ namely the pack dangling from his fingers.

“Ah, this?” Guydelot notes the subject of Sanson’s attention as the Adder captain settles onto his pristinely-made cot, for lack of another seat. “I got something for you.”

“For me?” Sanson’s surprise leaves him unguarded, a flash of earnestness dancing over his features – something he is sure to be teased for later, as is the usual. No matter what he does to deprive Guydelot of ammunition, the insufferable bard just _digs it up._

“Yes, for you, you dunce,” Guydelot replies, rolling his eyes again with an exaggerated gesture. “Did you forget about Starlight?”

Sanson had not. Merely he did not register the holiday as an important event for his personal schedule. He had no one to give presents to, and less than that to receive presents _from_ , so it would just be another day for the Twin Adder and another day for him as well.

“It’s next week,” Sanson says blandly, in an attempt to save face – because surely Guydelot had not been thinking about Sanson? Surely Guydelot had not devoted space in his airhead skull to planning a gift for Sanson, let alone spend his precious drinking gil on the man?

“‘It’s next week’,” Guydelot imitates him in a nasally voice. “Starlight is a _season,_ you big stiff. Admit it – you didn’t think you’d get anything for Starlight, so you’re pretending it’s _just another day_ , impressing your higher-ups with your diligence and making your peers sad on your joyless behalf.”

Sanson opens his mouth.

Then closes it.

Opens it again.

“Hit the nail, did I?” Guydelot asks, and his tone is _different_ – he’s dropped the light, joking, mocking tone he’s always cloaking himself in like a second skin, and instead he’s looking at Sanson as if he’s just _looking_ at him, instead of looking for things to tease him about.

There’s a heat that Sanson feels rising in his face and he wants to kick himself for being such a _schoolboy._

Guydelot’s eyes are knowing, gentle even. “I won’t tattle on you,” he says, and for all his bluster and bravado Sanson knows Guydelot the Spent is a man of his word. “Besides,” he continues, “the point’s moot. Here. I brought you something, remember?”

Sanson starts as Guydelot makes to toss the sack onto the bed, but apparently the bard thinks better of it with a grimace, and passes it to Sanson with careful, ungloved hands.

For a moment their bare fingers touch, and Sanson’s throat tightens a little at the contact. _What in Hydaelyn has gotten into me?_ he wonders to himself, wordlessly opening the hempen sack and drawing out the meticulously paper-packaged bundles within.

There are two of them, weighing firm and cool in his hands, and from the heft Sanson can tell they’re the same; so he sets one aside and places the other in his lap, fingering the waxy paper with his forefinger and thumb before slowly peeling it apart, unwrapping the gift.

The fruity smell hits him first, setting his mouth to watering. He’d never smelled something so rich; when he sheds the last layer of paper and lays eyes on the gift, he shakes his head in thinly veiled disbelief.

“ _Snurbleberry tarts?_ ” Sanson can scarce wrap his head around the picture he’s been presented with. Guydelot had somehow seen fit to spend his meager, hard-earned gil on the most extravagant sweets one could buy – and not for himself, but for _Sanson?_

The red jelly is already beginning to stain his fingertips, similar to rolanberry but for its prized barely-sour bite.

Guydelot seems like he’s about to say something but – bless his heart – he only nods at the tart as if encouraging Sanson to devour it _right now_ , which he’s happily about to with or without permission.

Maybe he’s visibly drooling.

But he can hardly help himself – it’s the most _gorgeous_ pastry he’s ever lain eyes upon, the dough surrounding the jellied filling perfectly symmetrical, even slightly squished as it had been in the bag. How in the seven hells had Guydelot even _found_ these? They must have cost him a fortune –

“Stop _thinking_ about the damn things and try one, will you?” Guydelot says gruffly, and Sanson only flushes a little, unable to counter him as he had indeed been doing exactly that.

The tarts came pre-cut, and Sanson balances a slice in his fingers and takes a gentle first nibble; rich flavor explodes across his tongue, the sort of flavor that surely only the High Houses of Ishgard ever got to taste, and he can’t stop himself from swallowing it quickly down and taking a greater, greedier bite. Halfway through the piece he remembers his manners and pauses to inhale, blushing what he is sure is a crimson to match the snurbleberries at the sight of Guydelot just watching him eat, a gentle, almost fond look in his eyes.

Sanson lowers the piece from his mouth, his lips surely also stained.

“What is it?” he asks, a little more crisply than he had intended, sounding truly annoyed with Guydelot instead of the slightly-put-upon tone he adopts to contrast with Guydelot’s snark. “Is there something on my face?”

Unaffected by the tone, Guydelot grins, a lopsided smirk that makes Sanson’s stomach twinge with – anticipation?

“As a matter of fact, you do,” he says, and raises his thumb to brush at the corner of Sanson’s mouth.

Sanson freezes in place, carefully not shivering an inch as his body so _desperately_ wants to, barely even breathing but for the tiniest exhale through his nose.

Guydelot has the grace to look embarrassed. “Sorry,” he says, blinking and pulling his hand away. “I just –”

“S’fine,” Sanson mutters through a mouthful of tart, deathly impolite, but he’d shoved the rest of it into his mouth in order to avoid having to react to this... _predicament._

He coughs a little, a hand over his mouth.

“Sweet Matron, Sanson!” Guydelot’s making a face at him. “Where are _your_ manners?”

“I’ th’ woods,” Sanson chokes back, eyes watering and hand pressing more firmly into his mouth, carefully working his jaw against the thick gelatin, thoroughly embarrassed by his panicked reaction to – what? An awkward silence? _Ridiculous._

Apparently the response is Sanson enough for Guydelot to roll his eyes yet again. “You’re insufferable, did you know that?”

With one last pained swallow and a hurried grope for the water jug he keeps by his bedside, a quick swig from it to clear his throat, Sanson replies. “As are you.”

“Maybe, but not like – Ugh,” Guydelot pinches his temple. “Judging from your suffocation attempt, you like the present?”

The switch in both topic and tone gives Sanson a moment of pause.

“It’s wonderful,” Sanson responds quietly. “Thank you.”

Guydelot doesn’t dignify the manners with a response beyond a conspiratorial wink. “And am I to understand that, given that you didn’t expect any gifts, you also did not pick out gifts for the wonderful bards in your life?”

Sanson’s mouth opens. Then closes again.

“I’ll have sad news for the Warrior of Light when we cross paths again,” Guydelot says airily. “Straight from the fish’s mouth.”

Sanson sighs. “Do you want me to pay you back for the gift?” he suggests, already standing from his seat on the bed to make for his desk and his coinpurse stashed within. “You must’ve spent so much on me, and I’ve nothing in return –”

“Oh, quit it,” Guydelot cuts him off, waving him back to his seat. “They were dirt cheap. Now that Rowena’s House of Splendors has an appraisers’ tent outside the Stalls, all sorts of adventurers are putting the masterpieces that didn’t make Rowena’s gil-happy cut on sale for gil on the bronze piece.”

Guydelot’s right about that, if nothing else. The House of Splendors deals in thousands upon thousands of collectables a day – where do the slightly-less-than-collectable collectables go? On the market for cheap, of course.

“Even so,” Sanson stresses, “it’s wrong of me to accept something for nothing in return. How much were they?”

“Not a gil.”

Sanson pauses, takes a deep look at Guydelot’s wolfish grin.

“And why is that?” he asks, knowing already that he doesn’t want to know the answer to the question.

“I may have... hm... pilfered them from a retainer in exchange for a ditty about her lovely brown eyes,” Guydelot responds easily, jerking a thumb to his harp, strapped firmly to his back just as his bow and quiver are, together just as they should be – for a bard, at least.

“And _I’m_ the insufferable one?” Sanson responds, a little higher-pitched than expected. “You’re feeding me _contraband_ and _I’m_ —”

“But they’re delicious, right?”

Guydelot’s grin is impossible to argue against.

“...yes,” Sanson admits begrudgingly. “But the point stands, Guydelot: _do not steal!_ Not even with ditties about maiden’s eyes! _Especially_ not on my behalf; you had me thinking you’d picked out some thoughtful gift on my behalf, and I—”

Guydelot stands out of his chair, rising over Sanson, who had not reseated himself as Guydelot had indicated earlier. The latter’s height was not so diminutive as to be dwarfed by Guydelot’s stature, but he still found himself looking up into Guydelot’s face, all handsome angles – a face that bends down closer to his, staring right into his eyes, making Sanson lean back just a _little_ bit in response.

“I did,” Guydelot responds, his light eyes searching Sanson’s face. “Out of the thousands upon thousands of luxurious _things_ I could’ve picked, I picked the one that you couldn’t possibly complain about. Nothing _useless,_ nothing _unnecessary;_ I know you, Sanson the Stiff, and I know a sweet is the only luxury you can’t make a case against.”

Guydelot straightens, leaving Sanson’s cheeks feeling a little cold, the latter not having noticed the fanning of Guydelot’s exhaled breath across his face until the absence of it could be felt.

Leaving Sanson struck standing in the center of his room, Guydelot steps over the chair and to the door, walking with an easy, loping stride, deceptively dexterous when he opens the door with barely a twist of his long fingers.

He halts in the doorway to look back at Sanson, still unmoving.

“And as for a present... hm... I suppose you can just,” the saucy wink he dusts the following declaration with could only be suited for a courtesan, “owe me a favor.”

And then he is gone, the door closed quietly behind him, a jarring contrast to the noise and bluster with which he had swept into Sanson’s room, into his life.

Sanson gapes at the door for a few moments, still starstruck, until a shiver racks his frame; his muscles had begun to seize in the awkward position.

 _I really am Sanson the Stiff,_ he thinks to himself, before burying his face in his hands with an audible groan.

He seats himself back on his cot, careful of the unfinished tart – _two_ of them, Guydelot _must_ know they’re going to be snatched from the icebox by some sticky-fingered private since Sanson absolutely, positively can’t finish even _half_ of one on his own – and pondering when his life became such a mess.

Damn Guydelot! Damn him and his perfect features, the way his lips had framed the word “favor” like something as rich as the snurbleberry tart, the creak of his leather trousers as he’d nearly split them on Sanson’s chair, the touch of his thumb against the corner of Sanson’s mouth –

_Gods._

Sanson rubs his face with both hands, and glances over at the tarts.

Well.

In characteristic _Stiff_ fashion, Sanson resolves to take the entire tangled mess of feelings surrounding Guydelot the Spent and shove them away until some indeterminate time at which he will be forced to confront them.

Likely whenever the owed _favor_ is called in.

But for the time being...

He has half a tart to plow through, and a tart and a half to hide strategically in the icebox so no one will think to touch them.

Maybe he should threaten any would-be thief with sentry duty somewhere _especially_ miserable. The Coerthan border, perhaps – sure to be frigid this time of year.

The cogs in Sanson’s head churn away once again, as they are wont to do when Guydelot is not near enough to make them jam.

And the robin in his eaves returns to its song, calling hopefully for a distant mate to answer.

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> edit to this a/n: bc i finished the brd questline through 70 - im so sorry!!! i should have mentioned more abt the 60-70 questline in the fic if i wanted it to be post sb, i suck, but i might write smth else addressing that so!!! take this fic as post sb msq but brd 60-70 hasn't yet happened :V and if i continue this sort of thing, ill address that there too, heh.
> 
> i know it's past starlight and into late heavensturn, but listen: i'm gay?
> 
> it's been on my mind for a few weeks and i've only gotten around to writing it now.
> 
> hmu on [twitter](twitter.com/gayprotagonist)


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